Maslenitsa: The Cheesefare Week

Maslenitsa, also
known as Butter Week, Pancake week, or Cheesefare Week, the Russian religious
and folk holiday.

Perhaps the most
cheerful holiday in Russia is Maslenitsa (Shrovetide). This holiday is
considered to come from pre-Christian times, when the Slavs were still pagans. In
the old days Maslenitsa was for remembrance of the dead. So the burning of the
figure of Maslenitsa means her funeral, and blini (pancakes) – coliphia. But
with time the Russians longing for fun and entertainment turned the sad holiday
into jolly Maslenitsa with blini – round, yellow and hot as the sun, sledding
and horse sleigh riding, fistfights and mother-in-law chatting. The rituals of
Maslenitsa are very unusual and interesting because they combine the end of the
winter holiday rituals and the opening of new spring festivals and ceremonies,
which were to promote a rich harvest.

Maslenitsa is
celebrated during the week preceding the Lent or the 7th week before Russian
Orthodox Easter (Pascha). Every day of Maslenitsa was devoted to special
rituals.

Maslenitsa. Monday is “Vstrecha” – “Meeting”.
On that day people made the straw-stuffed figure of Winter, dressed it in old
women’s clothing and singing carried it on sleigh around the village. Then the
figure was put onto snow-covered slope that people used for tobogganing, which
was considered not just fun, but the ancient rite, because it was thought that
the one who came down the hill more than once was likely to have tall flax in
summer.

Tuesday is
“Zaigryshi” which can roughly be translated as “games”. From that day on the
whole village started all sorts of activities: sleigh riding, folk festivals,
skomorokh (traveling actors) and puppet shows. The streets were full of people
in carnival costumes and masks, who visited homes of their neighbours and
organised impromptu concerts. Large groups of people rode troikas and simple
sleighs. Pancake Week in 18th century Moscow was hard to imagine without bear
shows. Bear fun was very popular among all classes of the population of towns
and cities, towns, and villages. Trained bears amused the audience, imitating
girls putting makeup are in front of the mirror or women baking pancakes.

Pancakes Wednesday
is “Lakomki” – “gourmands” – opened feasts in houses with blini and other
dishes. Each household had tables with delicious food, baked pancakes, and
brewed beer. Tents selling all kinds of food appeared everywhere. They sold hot
sbiten (drinks from water, honey and spices), nuts, honey gingerbreads and
poured tea from boiling samovars.

Thursday is called
“Shirokii razgul” which means “show time” or “revelry”!” It was then that the
hottest fistfights took place.

If on Wednesday
sons-in-law were treated with pancakes in their mothers-in-law homes, on Friday
it was their turn to arrange evenings with blini. On the day before
mothers-in-law had to send to their sons-in-law homes everything necessary for
blini making: pans, ladles etc., and fathers-in-law sent a bag of buckwheat and
some butter. The disrespect of the tradition from the part of a son-in-law was
considered dishonor and insult; it was a reason for life-long enmity.

A special attention
during Maslenitsa was paid to conjugal relations: the couples, married the
previous were honored and celebrated. The newlyweds were put on the spot in
villages: they were forced to each other in public, thrown at with old bast
shoes and straw and sometimes could come to the home of newlyweds and kiss the
young wife. Tradition required that they dress smartly and go to public places
in painted sleigh, pay a call to all who had visited their wedding, and go down
icy slope under accompaniment of a solemn song. Maslenitsa was the time of
mutual visits of families, which recently became related

Saturday is
“Zolovkiny posidelki” – newlywed wives visit their sisters-in-law, and bring
them some gifts.

Sunday is *the*
most important day of all – “The Forgiven or Forgiveness Sunday”. On that day
people asked each other for forgiveness for all grievances and troubles; in the
evening people went to cemeteries and “bid farewell” to the dead. On the last
day of Maslenitsa comes the most interesting event – saying goodbye to
Maslenitsa – a solemn burning of the stuffed figure of winter. People threw the
remnants of pancakes and food to the huge bonfire explaining their children
that all the nourishing food disappeared in fire to prepare them for the Lent.

Maslenitsa ended
with the first day of the Lent – Clean Monday, which was considered the day of
purification from sin and fast forbidden food. On Clean Monday people usually
washed in a bath; women washed dishes, cleaning them from grease and remains of
forbidden food.

Get ready –
everyone will be asking you to forgive them. In that case, you must answer “Bog
prostit – i ya proschau”, which means “God will forgive – and I do, as well”.

Oh, and don’t
forget to ask for forgiveness by yourself – that way, you’ll enter Great Lent
completely cleansed!

On Sunday, Lady
Maslenitsa figurine gets burned, and her ashes thrown on the soil to fertilize
it – that way we’ll be sure the spring is finally coming!

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